SAP-C02 Practice Question: Design Solutions for Organizational Complexity
A large enterprise uses AWS Organizations with hundreds of accounts. The central security team needs to enforce that no IAM users are created in any account; instead, all access must be through IAM roles federated with the corporate identity provider. The security team wants to detect any IAM user creation and automatically remediate it by deleting the user and notifying the security team. Which solution should be implemented?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates choose an SCP (Option C) because it prevents IAM user creation, but the question specifically requires detection and automatic remediation (deletion and notification), not just prevention.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Use AWS Config with a custom rule triggered by iam:CreateUser, and an AWS Lambda function that deletes the user and sends an Amazon SNS notification.
AWS Config custom rules can be triggered on specific API calls via AWS CloudTrail events. By configuring a custom rule with an AWS Lambda function triggered by iam:CreateUser, the solution can automatically delete the newly created IAM user and send an SNS notification to the security team, providing both detection and remediation.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Use AWS Config with a custom rule triggered by iam:CreateUser, and an AWS Lambda function that deletes the user and sends an Amazon SNS notification.
Why this is correct
Config rule triggers Lambda for automatic remediation and notification.
- ✗
Use IAM Access Analyzer to detect and report IAM user creation.
Why it's wrong here
Access Analyzer analyzes resource policies, not user creation events.
- ✗
Use an SCP to deny iam:CreateUser across all accounts.
Why it's wrong here
SCP can deny creation but does not delete existing users or notify.
- ✗
Enable AWS CloudTrail and create a metric filter for iam:CreateUser, then set up an Amazon CloudWatch alarm that triggers an SNS notification.
Why it's wrong here
Only notifies; does not delete the user.
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This SAP-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the SAP-C02 exam.